Church Planting Strategies
gotquestions..com defines church Plnting as "the establishing of an organized body of believers in a new location. The process of church planting involves evangelism, the discipleship of new believers, the training of church leaders, and the organization of the church according to the New Testament model. Usually the process also includes writing a church charter and/or doctrinal statement and finding a place to meet or buying property and erecting a new building."
Church planting is as vulnerable as it is exciting. It is a situation where something of eternal value is supposed to come out of nothing. This being the case, everyone, including you (the Church Planter) constantly wants to know: How's it going? What's happening? Where are the results?
Church planters are sometimes so enamored with a particular ministry model or idea and when it does not work in their "real world", they get embarrassed, defensive, and/or discouraged. However, in reality, finding a worship space may be an uphill spiritual battle; so you will have to start praying ahead of time, building a community is slower than you want it to be. It takes time to develop trust, grow as a leader, and wait on the Lord together in prayer.
Thankfully, once the community is in place, you have an entire team with gifts and energy that take the church so much farther than you could on your own. Your people will have more enthusiasm about the church plant if they have helped you shape it anyway. So go slow to go fast.
From a lot of research, we have put together the underlisted strategies and we trust God that it will be a blessing to every reader.
1. BE SURE YOU HAVE BEEN CALLED TO A PLANT CHURCH
It s a DANGEROUS thing to commission yourself to a journey that you have either not been called to take or that which belongs to someone else.
There are plenty of compelling church plant stories out there. They are good for inspiration and bad for copying!
Your journey is your own and will be partially discovered as God allows it to unfold.
2. GATHER A LAUNCH TEAM
A Launch Team is more like an ever-expanding party, where there is a winsome urgency to gather others, take risks, and be creative together. Launch Teams are also easier to leave, because the launch of the church gives the team a defined off-ramp.
Identify your motives for church planting, and be vulnerable enough to communicate them with the Launch team
Starting with the 'why' instead of starting with the 'what will make people move from being skeptics to being supporters of some kind.
3. PRAY AHEAD OF TIME FOR A WORSHIIP SPACE
Your worship space will become hugely influential to the development of your church, and finding the right venue can be as much a spiritual battle as it is a logistical one.
God answers prayers so let your intercession take on a desperate-but-hopeful intensity!
4. VALUE CONNECTION AND RELATIONSHIPS:
Church planting is LONELY, and many a church planter has perished through isolation.
Proverbs 18:1 says, “The man who isolates himself is not wise” and if you disregard your friendships and relationships when planting churches, your world can get small very quickly. Perhaps you can start churches anywhere, but wisdom is sensitive to relationships – while still refusing to be ruled by the insecurities of others.
A lot of Christian leaders who see the Kingdom grow in their city are "more concerned about reaching the whole city than about increasing God's kingdom."
This is where iCore can help. At out Partnership summits, we regularly share ideas, resources, and personal support. Our discussions have ranged from confession of sin to what goes into child activity bags for Launch Sunday. If you are planting or pastoring, I encourage you to fight the temptation to posture.
Our mandate is “to champion the cause of local churches everywhere”, and the greatest way we can do that is exemplifying what God can do, by partnering and being in good relationship with other churches in our city, and without building on other people’s foundations
If you don't collaborate, you miss an opportunity to aid other church plants, and you lose what other pastors could give to your church so collaborate with fellow planters and pastors; don't compete with them. HRemember that having the resources of people and money makes church planting possible, not easier.
5. BE FLEXIBLE WITH HOW PEOPLE GRAPPLE WITH YOUR VISION
Be patient with people who over-engage or under-engage with my vision for the church. This involves taking the risk of giving people room to disagree, and give them the choice of self-selecting out rather than making that choice for them. Strong leaders need freedom to disagree with you and share their ideas, knowing that you take them seriously.
Keeping your vision solid and exercising flexible patience is a tension to maintain, not a problem to solve. If you eliminate the tension, you forfeit the opportunity to include some of your best people.
6. RECOGNIZE YOUR GRACE ZONE:
Church planting is a GRACE and if you stay “within the sphere of the grace God has given you,” His favor and blessing will be on your endeavors.
It is important to stay in your lane and run your own race.
7. JESUS BUILDS HIS CHURCH - HE IS NOT LOOKING FOR YOUR HELP
Jesus builds his church so getting certain people in the door is ultimately not your responsibility.
As a church planter, there is a possibility that you will begin to worry about who is and who isn't showing up for worship services. Forinstancem there may be thoughts like, "Why wasn't ____ or ____ there tonight?" Or: "Why doesn't X or Y type of person come, and how can this be changed?"
It may interest you to know that who God brings and who God does not bring to your church is His responsibility (not yours).
8. AVOID THE PERILS OF SHORTCUTS, OR INDIVIDUALS WHO PROMISE THE WORLD:
Church planting is TEAMWORK, which means building a leadership team who are there for the long haul. Often the people who promise the most, don’t always come through with the most. Great churches are built with people who are faithful in the little things. I’d take a group of ordinary people devoted to an extraordinary God, over a charismatic someone that talks a big game, but hasn’t proven faithful in the ‘day of small beginnings’.
We know of some amazing miracles with land and buildings, but we have also said no to numbers of opportunities and partnerships because there were ‘strings attached’. If it looks too good to be true, it probably too good to be true.!
9. PRAY FOR THE RIGHT PEOPLE IN THE RIGHT PLACE, AT THE RIGHT TIME:
Church planting involves LEADERSHIP and it will be more successful when you sow some of your best people. If you are solving a problem by repositioning someone who is causing frustration, you are only transferring the problem. It is when you give your best that you can expect the best outcome – which is again why planting or expanding should be done from a position of strength and not vulnerability.
10. BE SURE YOU HAVE COUNTED THE COST:
Church planting is COSTLY and can be very difficult if you are unable to invest sacrificially into the work you are starting. Faith is essential in any new venture and there is no doubt that dependence on God and His miraculous supply is part of the adventure. However, many years of pain and heartache can be avoided if you have counted the cost and sacrificially invested into the new ground you are claiming.
